1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a document processing apparatus and method for managing a plurality of documents each containing a plurality of document elements.
2. Related Background Art
In a past, a cut and paste method has been used as a method for defining a content of a document as a content of another document. For example, let us consider a case in which abstracts of a certain number of articles are to be prepared.
FIG. 2 shows article document data and FIG. 3 shows abstract document data. They follow the SGML description method in which a document element starts with a document element start symbol <xxx> and ends with a document element end symbol </xxx>, where xxx contains a document name of the document element. A character string between the document element start symbol and the document element end symbol represents document element content. It is assumed that the document element comprises a document element name and document element content. Other secondary information may also be included.
Where content “defg, hijk” of a document element <abstract> of the article document data of FIG. 2 is to be quoted as is for the content of a document element <itemparagraph> of the abstract document data of FIG. 3, the existing content “lmno,” of <itemparagraph> is first erased, and the content “defg, hijk” of the <abstract> is pasted in situs by the cut and paste method.
Alternatively, the foregoing may be realized by a hyperdocument method. In this method, a link to the content of other document data is pasted from a certain portion of a document and a button 47 shown in FIG. 4 is filled in that portion. When the button is clicked, another window appears so that the content of the other document data, to which the link was pasted, is displayed.
However, in the cut and paste method, since the identical data are copied and present at two locations as separate data, when a common portion is corrected in either one of the article or the abstract and it is desired that content at both locations shall match, the same correction must be made for the other. This is not effective because the same correction is repeated twice, and if done only once, the desired conformity is lost.
Further, in the method of pasting the link, the above problem is solved but the button must be clicked in order to display the document data to which the link was pasted, on the display, and where multiple sharing is made in order to display it on another window than that on which the document data having the button embedded therein is displayed, the number of windows increases and the windows overlap. Thus, the display is complex, and it becomes hard for the user to grasp the series of documents.
Further, since they share the document data including the document layouts, it is not possible to display the respective documents with required layouts.